I bought this laptop at around $600 and I also bought a Samsung SSD EVO 850 250GB for another $100, so the total amount is $700. This laptop has core i7 6500U, 16Gb of RAM 1600Mhz, 1Tb HDD, FHD touch screen and AMD Radeon R5 M335 4Gb. This is my 2nd laptop after 5 years using HP HDX16, so I wanted to really have an good upgrade to do multitasks but not depending heavily on specs for gaming because I have consoles to play with. I scanned the market for around 2 weeks to finally land on this one but it was not my first final choice. I first decided to go with Lenovo Flex 4 which has a higher specs at cheaper price at the same store which I purchased this Dell laptop [other stores didn’t have that laptop]. And I was told to wait for the next shipment which they were not sure that it will contain my model or not. So, I asked for another laptops and they were not available, then I asked for the list of in-stock laptops and the staff introduced this to me. The specs is a little lower and $50 higher than the lenovo but the design won me over. I decided to buy this one at the end.
I read reviews about the hardwares and this laptop so I knew what I’m getting at, and I expected it to takes on multitasks in a good manner. It fell a little short but I’m satisfied with it overal. As I mentioned before, I bought the SSD to replace the internal HDD, and turn the internal HDD into an external HDD. At the end, this became quite a good deal for me. About me, I do many things from programming to multimedia editing, and I want my laptop to be quite versatile. Here is my review:
Hardware upgrade: If you don’t have a need to use DVD drive like me, then you should replace it with a caddy bay which allow you to expand your internal storage, and that is what I will do in the future. About RAM memory, you can’t, 16Gb is the maximum capacity. And I spoke to Dell rep about upgrading the modules to higher speed, he told me I could but I really don’t need to because the maximum clock speed is 1800Mhz and I won’t be able to see any difference..
Screen: This is a nice screen, the color looks fine to me and it displays black color quite well. I don’t have problem with the touch screen so far. However, they placed the screen a little deep in order to protect the screen from scratches caused by keyboard when the lid is closed. I got that, but now, it is a little hard to slide your finger from 4 sides. And trust me, this is no longer Windows 7, you really should have a touch screen laptop to use with Windows 10. Why? To be more versatile and compatible with the system. If it wasn’t for the touch screen, I would have more cheaper and more powerful options for the laptop. And this one stood out of the crowd. The screen has 2 framerates which are 60Hz and 48Hz. Some argues that by setting to 48Hz, the power consumption from the screen will be reduced. Makes sense. I tried that, and I did notice a lower power consumption but not so much. By setting the framerate to 48Hz, you will experience minor lagging while watching videos which are at 60 frames per second. There are no tempered glass for 15.6″ screen in the market. Only screen protector.
Keyboard: The buttons are quite flat and responsive enough. It can’t be compared to the one on HP HDX16, the difference is quite big as the HP is a premium series while this one is just a middle class. Dell also put some useful key function combinations, and you can learn that by download the manual from Dell website. Keyboard has backlit and it has a button to disable and enable [2 levels of brightness] it. I saw many people had problem with this and I hope mine would not come to that state. One weird thing about this keyboard is at button F10, the keyboard panel is not stationed as screwed down. The panel is lifted a little to almost hard to notice until you pressed on F10 and the area around it. I don’t really like when it’s kind of flimsy like that. And the buttons are easily to have marks of finger prints, and I am don’t have sweaty hands.
Touch pad: It is not really smooth and good. I think it’s because of the surface material, it is kind of glossy. Coming from and clean polish surface of HP and ASUS, this will take me sometimes to get confortable with it.
Fan and heating: I am very amazed that the fan is very quiet to almost unnoticeable, it’s like I’m using a fanless laptop. You can start to hear it when the workload is heavy meaning the processor running at very high speed, but it’s still not loud like the old laptop. You can feel it not by the noise it makes but by the heat it produces. I’m happy with it. While browsing for parts to upgrade, I also saw that the optical drive can also be replaced by another fan. I really can’t tell if that would help or not because that side of the laptop is pretty cool most of the time. About the heating, it stays on the half-left side where the fan is located. The concentration is nearly at the center but I wouldn’t call it’s hot. The heating stays at warm level so there is no problem to use it on your lap or at any surface. The heating stays near the half-top-left side and on the keyboard surface you wouldn’t feel much so there won’t be any problem to your left hand. And the palm rest part is cool most of the time. Have no complain on this.
Processor: Core i7 6500U 2.99Ghz is a decent one, and not too powerful. I usually use HandBrake to convert videos and I used it on Asus Transformer T100, so that is what I need to test this processor. My T100 uses Atom Z3775 1.46Ghz, and to convert a 1080p video to another 1080p for a smaller size, this tablet would take around 3-4 hours [2 hours if I got lucky] at around 10-30fps decoding. This tablet takes around 1 hour to finish one at around 50-80fps decoding. While decoding, the processor is utilized at 99%, and that is when you can feel the heat being blown out of the vent. I also use Visual Studio 2017 with Android Emulator and it runs smoothly without any problem. Therefore, I think this one will do just fine with Photoshop and other profession softwares. Again, this processor is not powerful but good enough.
RAM: My old HP has 4Gb of RAM and my T100 has 2Gb of RAM. One uses Windows 10 Pro and the other uses Windows 10 Home, respectively. This laptop came with Home and I upgraded to Pro. 4Gb of RAM used to be the best for like 5-6 years ago, and now, 8Gb is just moderate. That’s why I had to get the one with 16Gb of RAM. This laptop when it’s boot up, the system consumes around 2-2.5Gb. And after I fully installed all of my softwares, now the system consumes around 2.5-3Gb. Speaking of RAM consumption, we can’t just leave Chrome browser out of the discussion. This software devours the memory, I could see that my RAM was consumed up to nearly 6Gb when Chrome browser is running with many tabs. You see? 8Gb is just not enough nowadays, it’s better to have extra space to feel at easy while multitasking.
SSD: I didn’t use this laptop with its original HDD [which is from WD] so I cannot tell if there is a difference. I just wanted to use an SSD to be a real upgrade from the old HP. This laptop takes a little while [5-7 secs] to get through Dell boot screen, after that, it takes around 2 secs to Login screen. My T100 takes around 10 secs from Asus boot screen to the Login screen. SSD does help with internal works meaning the tasks are carried only by the SSD itself. It would provide a high stable read and write with external storage. For software installation, comparing to T100, this is blazing fast, of course. When I reset Windows 10 in T100, the process would take up to 2 hours or more to complete. And this laptop with SSD takes around 30-45 mins to finish, and it consumed around 30% of the battery. I also did splitting and merging files and there was no sweat. I am happy with this upgrade.
Graphic card: What is the word for it? “Meh”. That is what I also heard from others. And I confirmed. This practically can’t play any good title games, and by that, I meant The Witcher Enhance Edition. This can be considered an old game because even I set the settings to Low, and the resolution to 1368×768. The game still lags. I tried Ori and Blind Forest, I also had to set the resolution to 1368×768 to have a decent frame rate. So, I really don’t know what this graphic card was made for and this laptop also have Intel HD Graphics 520, but this is just not at middle class. This is just at entry level. Disappointing as I thought it would be this bad.
Update: I decided to give The Witcher another try and this time I tested with GOG version. Surprisingly, the game runs so much smoother now. I can run it at 1080p with High settings. I guess AMD driver was not properly installed before, and the game used Intel graphic card instead. I have tried to install it again. I had to open Installer to make sure that not only just the software was installed. So, I retract what I said about this graphic card. Or may be the previous version was not packed properly.
Speakers: The speakers are really loud at 100%. I can’t say about quality but I think it’s decent. I don’t watch movies nor listen to music from laptops anymore. But sometimes, the speakers give a pop sound when there is a sudden change of pitches, like notification sounds. I hope this one is not defected.
Battery: Well, this has a so-so battery life. Everyone says it could last around 4hours, and when they say that, it means it would be less. So I knew and I don’t think it would be a big problem as I still have my T100 for mobility as it can still last for around 7-9 hours. After a few days of using it, I can confirm that at low usage which means the processor is utitlized less than 50% of its capacity, this laptop could last from 4-5 hours at 50% of brightness with Wifi on. I replaced the HDD for SSD also to lower the power consumption and the optical drive is next. When the processor is used at near 99%, you should expect the battery to drop drastically, and I mean it. The battery would go down from 100% to 10% in within 2 hours or less, I tested with Handbrake with 0% of brightness and Wifi off. So, I suggest not to do heavy tasks while the laptop running on battery. I also got some number for you to easy to understand, these numbers are taken from BatteryBar software. These are all my personal rating.
T100: Low usage, 2,500 – 4,000 mW. Medium, 4,000 – 7,000 mW. High 7,000 – 9,000 mW
5559: Low usage, 5,000 -7,000 mW. Medium, 7,000 – 15,000 mW. High 15,000 – 25,000 mW
As you can see, this laptop consumes a lot of power while its battery capacity is around 10,000 mWh higher than my T100 [30,225 mWh].
I would suggest you to go to Dell Support website to download Power Manager Lite from them to have better management on the battery. Or you can do that in BIOS settings.
One great thing about this is the charging time. According to Dell’s manual, it states the charging time is 4 hours. However, it always takes around 1hours to full charge my battery or 1.5 hours if I use the laptop while charging. I don’t know if there is anything wrong with this battery but the life time and charging time like this, I am fine with it. Oh, and when it’s fully charge, the laptop will use power directly from the power supply and not through the battery.
Other things: This laptop has a white led light at the front panel and it can be switched to different modes. This one is not so nice, so I just leave it by default which is to indicate the charging. The surface of the palm rest has a nice touch but you would leave finger prints and mark on it. I think the material is some sort of TPU plastic.
Overall, at this price, $700 for a nice design 15.6″ FHD touch screen laptop with core i7, 16Gb of RAM, 250Gb of SSD, 1Tb of HDD, decent graphic cards, good loud speakers and so-so battery is a really good deal. However, buying electronics nowadays is like gambling because QC process is not what the brands claimed how it should be. So… take your chances!
Is Dell Inspiron 15 5559 good?
Reviews for the Dell Inspiron 15 5559-1898 Negative: Difficult to clean; uncomfortable keyboard; few USB 3.0 ports; weak speakers; low speed HDD; hardware overheating. Positive: Durable and good design; comfortable keyboard; long battery life; good internal and external temperatures. Negative: Poor viewing angles.
What is the spec of Dell Inspiron 5559 i7?
Dell Inspiron 5559 is a Ubuntu laptop with a 15.60-inch display that has a resolution of 1920x1080 pixels. It is powered by a Core i7 processor and it comes with 16GB of RAM. The Dell Inspiron 5559 packs 2TB of HDD storage. Graphics are powered by AMD Radeon R5 M335.
When was the Dell Inspiron 5559 made?
The Dell Inspiron 15-5559 is a laptop that was released by Dell in 2015. The top of the screen features a web camera and two speakers.
Are Dell Inspiron laptops worth it?
Verdict. The Dell Inspiron 14, with a quality overall user experience and capable performance is a good value proposition for working professionals and students. While the laptop delivers a power-packed performance, it skims on a few features like better display and sound quality.